A Pæan Poem by Edgar Allan Poe I How shall the burial rite be read? The solemn song be sung? The requiem for the loveliest dead, That ever died so young? II Her friends are gazing on her, And on her gaudy bier, And weep!—oh! to dishonor Dead beauty with a tear! III They loved […]

ISRAFEL POEM by Edgar Allan Poe And the angel Israfel, whose heart-strings are a lute, and who has the sweetest voice of all God’s creatures.—Koran. In Heaven a spirit doth dwell “Whose heart-strings are a lute;” None sing so wildly well As the angel Israfel, And the giddy Stars (so legends tell) Ceasing their hymns, […]

THE VALLEY OF UNREST POEM by Edgar Allan Poe Once it smiled a silent dell Where the people did not dwell; They had gone unto the wars, Trusting to the mild-eyed stars, Nightly, from their azure towers, To keep watch above the flowers, In the midst of which all day The red sunlight lazily lay. […]

TO HELEN POEM by Edgar Allan Poe [“Helen” was Mrs. Stannard, whose death also inspired Lenore.] Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore, That gently, o’er a perfumed sea, The weary, wayworn wanderer bore To his own native shore. On desperate seas long wont to roam, Thy hyacinth hair, thy […]

To —— POEM by Edgar Allan Poe The bowers whereat, in dreams, I see The wantonest singing birds, Are lips—and all thy melody Of lip-begotten words— Thine eyes, in Heaven of heart enshrined, Then desolately fall, O God! on my funereal mind Like starlight on a pall— Thy heart—thy heart!—I wake and sigh, And sleep […]

AL AARAAF POEM by Edgar Allan Poe AL AARAAF POEM PART I. O! nothing earthly save the ray (Thrown back from flowers) of Beauty’s eye, As in those gardens where the day Springs from the gems of Circassy— O! nothing earthly save the thrill Of melody in woodland rill— Or (music of the passion-hearted) Joy’s […]

SONNET—TO SCIENCE POEM by Edgar Allan Poe Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art! Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes. Why preyest thou thus upon the poet’s heart, Vulture, whose wings are dull realities? How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise, Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering […]

ROMANCE POEM by Edgar Allan Poe Romance, who loves to nod and sing, With drowsy head and folded wing, Among the green leaves as they shake Far down within some shadowy lake, To me a painted paroquet Hath been—a most familiar bird— Taught me my alphabet to say— To lisp my very earliest word While […]

FAIRY-LAND POEM by Edgar Allan Poe Dim vales—and shadowy floods— And cloudy-looking woods, Whose forms we can’t discover For the tears that drip all over Huge moons there wax and wane— Again—again—again— Every moment of the night— Forever changing places— And they put out the star-light With the breath from their pale faces. About twelve […]

TO M—— POEM by Edgar Allan Poe O! I care not that my earthly lot Hath little of Earth in it, That years of love have been forgot In the fever of a minute: I heed not that the desolate Are happier, sweet, than I, But that you meddle with my fate Who am a […]

TO THE RIVER —— POEM by Edgar Allan Poe Fair river! in thy bright, clear flow Of crystal, wandering water, Thou art an emblem of the glow Of beauty—the unhidden heart— The playful maziness of art In old Alberto’s daughter; But when within thy wave she looks— Which glistens then, and trembles— Why, then, the […]

THE LAKE—TO—— POEM by Edgar Allan Poe In spring of youth it was my lot To haunt of the wide world a spot The which I could not love the less— So lovely was the loneliness Of a wild lake, with black rock bound, And the tall pines that towered around. But when the Night […]